World Rowing Championships 2014 - Day 6

There was a silver medal for Alan Sinclair from Inverness and bronze for Forfar's Sam Scrimgeour in Friday's session of finals at the World Rowing Championships here in Amsterdam.

Sinclair was racing in coxed pairs with crew-mates Scott Durant and cox Henry Fieldman and they had qualified by winning their opening heat last weekend. While they went to the start as real medal contenders they also found themselves up against the outstanding coxless pairs Olympic and multiple world champions from New Zealand, Eric Murray and Hamish Bond, who have entered both coxed and coxless pairs at these Championships.

Off the start the British crew kept pace with New Zealand, but at the first 500-metre mark, the New Zealanders pushed through to take a lead that they built on throughout the rest of the race. The British crew did well after this to concentrate on the other crews round about them and eventually resisted the challenge of Germany to take a well-deserved silver.

After the race, Sinclair said, "That was pretty challenging. We had our best start so far and that put us in contention. We tried to stay consistent - we always knew they'd (New Zealand) push through after the first 500 and we knew we needed just to stay in our own race. "

In the lightweight pairs final Scrimgeour and his partner Jonathan Clegg were in contention throughout and led for the first 500 meters. But they could not resist defending champions Switzerland who moved through before halfway. In the closing stages, the Swiss kept clear of the field while France threatened the British duo. France crossed the line less than half a second up to take silver, pushing Scrimgeour and Clegg into bronze position.

Afterwards, Scrimgeour was pleased just to have won a medal. He said, "we've had a good season and things have come together for the World Championships."

Earlier in the day, with a strong tailwind producing world best times in several events, the British lightweight four finished second in their semi-final behind Denmark to qualify for Sunday's final.

The Olympic champions of Lossiemouth's Heather Stanning and her partner Helen Glover will race in the first of Saturday's finals, women's pairs.